How we cite our quotes: (Act.Line)
Quote #10
BARBARA: Is there no higher power than that [pointing to the shell]?
CUSINS: Yes: but that power can destroy the higher powers just as a tiger can destroy a man: therefore Man must master that power first. I admitted this when the Turks and Greeks were last at war. My best pupil went out to fight for Hellas. My parting gift to him was not a copy of Plato's Republic, but a revolver and a hundred Undershaft cartridges. The blood of every Turk he shot—if he shot any—is on my head as well as on Undershaft's. That act committed me to this place for ever. Your father's challenge has beaten me. Dare I make war on war? I dare. I must. I will. And now, is it all over between us? (3.410-411)
Dolly is still musing about power, reflecting that his Greek lessons probably weren't as helpful to his former student as the cartridges he gave him as a parting gift when he left to fight. In his view, that gift means that he was already "committed" to the Undershaft cause, and now he's just making it official.